2000 ls halp!

[KHM]

Took my LS to the dealership today, 150 dollar diagnosis. Actually had my dad do it, I don't do well interacting with professional mechanics. I gave them the lowdown on what was wrong with it, primarily it overheats very fast. I figured water pump, but I don't know nothing about fixing stuff. Also front driver side has a knock, and its got the leaky oil burning gasket problem. Also the driver inside door handle is broken.

Car has 80k on the clock, I still like the car, but I'm not in love anymore. Its not great in the Alaska winter, its kinda small for my 6'5" frame. I'd like to keep it around, but I don't need it. I kinda thinking about an old suby, my moms has a 12 year old forester, and the thing is a rocket in the snow. I think I want one.

So my dad came back with the diagnosis. Tie rod broken on the front end, 1500 bucks. Guy thinks the car hit something. Kinda scary thinking about me flying down the flats at 120. Temp problem, fan is dead. 1100 bucks. Dad told him about the gasket problem, mechanic say you practically have to pull the engine to replace the head gasket. That doesn't inspire a lot of confidence, burning oil seems to be a fairly common problem in this engine, I would think the dealership mechanic would zero on the valve cover gaskets fairly quick, especially for a 150 dollar diagnostic fee.

So I'm looking at 3 grand minimum to get this car roadworthy. Probably 4. I've got a long history of getting screwed over by mechanics, and my first reaction is to pull the tires off, cut out the catalytic converter off and drop the car at a junkyard. This may not be the wisest choice.

Trying to think about it rationally, I figure I have three choices. Scrap the car, fix it completely and use it, or get it driveable and sell it on craigslist to someone that fixes and sells cars in their spare time.

Scrapping it is an emotional response, but on reflection it doesn't that sound that irrational. The tires are brand new, 500 bucks retail, might get 250 on craigslist. And problem is gone.

Driveable sounds like the rational thing to do, but that is a lot of money to drop in a car that I'm not in love with. And don't need this car, haven't had a working car in two months. (starter switch went out in my 79 conti, that's another thread So I don't need a car, but I should have a working vehicle. I've got a "Everyone loves Raymond" family situation here, I can borrow a car whenever I need it and combined with a company car I could be car-less. Inconvenient though. If the LS was 100% it would be my most reliable car, with the lowest mileage. But still a money pit when something breaks.

Getting it roadable and selling is the solution I like. Get some cash out of the deal, car gets to live on, I can feel sad and sentimental when I see it on the road. Problem here is twofold. Roadable is fixing the overheating. With an 1100 fan. Second part of the problem, finding a person on craigslist that wants to fix up a ford/jag with low production numbers/expensive parts and an impractical Alaska vehicle.

So I'm not sure what to do. My question to all of you, besides whatever offers of advise you would like to offer, is how in the hell does it cost 1100 bucks to replace a radiator fan? Is this a normal price?

 

[02LincLS]

Bend Over

Your dad charged you for a diagnosis? Ouch.

Suspension: You could drive into an NTB and they look at the suspension free because they want you to repair it there. The car would not be driveable with a broken tie rod end (well it could, but one of the wheels would be turned and dragging inside the fender). There are actually 4 tie rod ends in the front (each side has 2 inners, about $50 each and 2 outers, about $90 each). It should only be about $500 to get all of them replaced including parts and labor. The back has 2 similar links, check those for play as well.

Next, the cooling. There's lots of threads on that, use the search at the top of the page. I don't know how it was concluded that the fan was bad, but judging by the $1500 tie rod repair quote, I would not believe this to be true. The most common failure (and one of the cheapest to check first) is the degas reservoir where you add the coolant. It develops hairline cracks where you can't visually see them and they prevent the bottle from pressurizing. When that happens, the boiling temp drops and you start introducing air into the system. It also pulls air into the system when it cools back down. Did they pressure test the degas tank and the cap? Sometimes a lack of sufficient coolant level will cause the overheat, make sure its filled to the cold mark when cold. Replace the degas tank if required (DIY for about $100) and follow this air bleeding instructions to the letter http://www.lincolnvscadillac.com/tech/Lincoln-LS/CoolingSystemDraining/ . If you still have issues, check the rest of the coolant lines. The fan should come on whenever the A/C compressor is on.

If there is still a problem with the fan then that price seems at least in the ballpark. The fan is an over-engineered pile of $hit. It uses a (separate) power steering pump, reservoir, and hydraulic fan. If the pump did go bad, it could contaminate the fan and all the lines. $1100 seems a bit high. You can convert to an electric fan but it involves somewhat custom installation. Do a search as a few people here have done it and documented their work.

These engines are not "known for burning oil". What is your consumption? How often do you add oil and how much? How does he know the VCG's are bad? Did he see oil in the spark plug wells? How much? A drip or two could be considered normal. More than that may cause ignition coil on plug failures. This amount of oil could not likely be the cause of your oil level drop unless its pouring out. You do not have to pull the engine to do the valve cover gaskets. Many people have removed their valve covers right in their driveway with basic hand tools. Once again, search the forums, they may even mention a repair price. It still may be expensive for a shop to do it though. Great care should be taken whenever working with these composite covers to ensure they are torqued down using the proper sequence to avoid cracking them. You also don't want to drop anything inside the engine while it is opened or you're all done. I'm not convinced you need to do this repair though.

I think you need to go to a reputable repair place. It sounds like they're just throwing parts at it. You should be back up and running for about $1000-$1500 which is much cheaper than a car payment for 5 years.

 

[KHM]

Dad didn't charge me, he just took it to the shop for me. When he picked up the car one of the guys at the shop offered to buy the car for 500 bucks

Oil consumption is normal, a little smoke when the engine is hot, and no visible oil. Figured I should get it fixed before it ruined some coils.

One more question, if fan was bad, wouldn't my coolant temps be very high? The temp gauge goes up halfway to normal temps, and then it shoots up to max. Let the car set for 10 mins, temp gauge is back at half, but shoots right up again. I added some coolant, that of course wasn't the problem, drove a quarter mile, popped of the coolant cap and the antifreeze was cool to the touch. I figured it was the water pump, not a fan.

Thanks for your answers, I really appreciate the info.

 

[hite337]

I agree with the above post, if your tie rod is broken you cant drive the car. You most likely dont have a blown head gasket. I have heard of one blown head gasket on these cars and that was some idiot who drove it everyday for 3 years overheating to the point the car shut off. One of your plastic cooling system parts has a crack in it, most likely the degas bottle.
If you dont work on cars or have enuf $ for the dealer repairs, get rid of your LS. Its not cheap to maintain unless you are mechanically inclined. The plus side is once you get all the bugs fixed, it is a great car.

 

[1LoudLS]

Your dad charged you for a diagnosis? Ouch.

no he doesn't interact well with professional mechanics, so his dad took it in and had it diagnosed

i would have a pretty hard time putting four grand into a 2000 for basic repairs/non modification (i would have a hard time doing that to my 03) unless everything else was perfect or mods had an extensive amount of time/money/labor/effort into it.

if your not in love with the car, and it doesn't fit your needs, then that's a huge chunk of money that should go towards something that does.

is how in the hell does it cost 1100 bucks to replace a radiator fan? Is this a normal price?

dealer = high priced labor
Hydraulic cooling fan system = uncommon expensive parts

high priced labor + uncommon expensive parts = expensive repair

this is why so many people just replace the system with a normal electrical fan for a fraction of the cost.

 

[KHM]

When my dad picked up the car one of the employees offered him 500 dollars for it. My dad says that the guy was going to pull the engine and tranny and convert it into a four wheel drive car. I did know that was possible.

I don't buy it being the fan. I've had cars overheat before, steam pours out of the hood and they take ages to cool off. If I let the car sit for 15 minutes, the temp gauge goes from redline to normal operating temp and takes 4 minutes to go from normal to redline if I start the car up. Seems to me more like the coolant isn't circulating or there isn't any coolant.

As for the burning oil, it just smokes a tiny bit, I've been worrying about it for a couple years.

Thanks for the info, its a huge help to a mechanically challenged person like myself.

 

[Dino'sLSdeuce]

I agree with 02LincLS and hite337 about the overheating problem. I had a overheating problem less then a month ago. I read through all those overheating threads and all the possible parts responsible for the overheating problem itself. But, like they say...start with the degas bottle tank. I pulled out my degas bottle and "once" you let it completely dry..."OOHH WOOW" you'll see those stress cracks more definitely. Sure enough, I put in the new degas bottle, along with the replacement ring clamps > BANG less then 1-hour later everything was back together. Bled the system. My Problem solved.

This site is one big "Excedrin Tablet" for all my would-be car head-aches...
What a relief.

 

[02LincLS]

no he doesn't interact well with professional mechanics, so his dad took it in and had it diagnosed

ahh, i see what he meant.

That was actually the KHM's comment about $1100 for the fan. I thought it was high, but in the right ballpark.

KHM, take your car somewhere else. Its not beyond repair, despite the crap their feeding you. Its still worth more than $500. With what we've shared with you, you have no reason not to be able to go in and tell them what to fix with confidence.

It overheats immediately because the coolant is not circulating. That's easily fixed by finding the failed part and bleeding the air out after you replace it per instructions in my first reply.

Someone mentioned head gaskets for the smoke; you would likely have coolant in your oil or vice versa if this was the case and white smoke out the exhaust (the color is important). Valve cover gaskets I think are what you should look at judging by your description. This would make oil burning smell under the hood but not out the exhaust. Small amounts of smoke are normal if you repeatedly don't drive for long periods of time, which drives all the moisture out of the system. How often do you add oil?

 

[KHM]

Update

I followed the directions for bleeding the coolant system. Hardest part was finding the fill cap. Didn't know what piece of plastic to look under. Other than that it was stupid simple. Normal temps now, normal for this car anyway, the thermostat has been stuck open for a while now.

Its drivable now, I'm going to take it to someone to look at the bent tie rod,(not broken).

Glad I didn't sell it for 500 bucks. I owe LVC and you guys some serious karma.